Samsung Galaxy S III Steals Phone Crown From iPhone

Apple’s iPhone is no longer the most popular smartphone according to data from Strategy Analytics. Between July and September of this year, 18 million units of Samsung Galaxy S III were shipped compared with 16.2 million units of Apple’s iPhone 4S.

"A large touch-screen design, extensive distribution across dozens of countries, and generous operator subsidies have been among the main causes of the Galaxy S3's success," says Neil Shah, a senior Analyst at Strategy Analytics. The new Galaxy enjoys an 11 percent market share overall, selling 30 million phones in the first five months according to PCMag.com.

The soaring Samsung sales might have ironically benefitted from a claim by Apple that the smartphone was a copy of theirs, which gave way to Samsung’s ad campaign mocking those who wait for hours on line to buy an iPhone while passersby point out the similarities in the products.

“The Apple iPhone 5 has gotten off to a solid start already with an estimated 6.0 million units shipped globally during Q3 2012. We expect the new iPhone 5 to out-ship Samsung’s Galaxy S3 in the coming fourth quarter of 2012 and Apple should soon reclaim the title of the world’s most popular smartphone model,” Mawston wrote on his blog.

The Apple iPhone 5 hit stores on Sept. 21, which is the tail-end of the third quarter. According to Apple it sold 26.9 million iPhones last month, but did not break down the number to reflect sales by each model.